Confession of a Murderer

I have read my share of Roth’s novels and though I have inevitably found some better than others, I’ve loved a few of them and liked almost every single one. Until now. The writing here is good but the story not only never fully engaged me; instead, the story seemed a bit endless (a depressing achievement in a book of only 180 small pages), became tiresome and I was tempted more than once to simply stop reading. With each new page, I cared less and less what happened to our protagonist—something that’s never happened to me with Joseph Roth before. The framed story is a tale told all in the course of a single night by Golubchik, a Russian émigré, in Paris. “I am a murderer,” he announces at the outset and the tale that show more follows recounts why he makes the claim. It is a claim rooted in the quirks and impulses of identity: Golubchik is the bastard son of Peter Kropotkin (spelled ‘Krapotkin’ in this translation), a real, enormously powerful and influential figure in early 20th century Russia. Golubchik’s search for his identity becomes inextricably bound up with the pursuit of revenge, leading him to join the Okhrana, the czar’s secret police. The story becomes more than a little convoluted, pulling in everyone from a model with whom Golubchik becomes smitten to a shadowy Hungarian stand-in for the devil to a family of Jews targeted for kidnapping. Were this my introduction to Roth, I might not look for him again; as it is, a disappointing outing. show less

A strange little tale that ties itself up and finally concedes defeat by its conclusion.

It takes place in a seedy European bar, with a would-be murderer relating his crime, and the reasons for it, to an assembled crowd of drunkards and societal detritus.

The telling is far better than the story being told, and the ending? What a shame.

Onversneden Roth-leesplezier! Meesterlijk verteld verhaal over een vermeende moordenaar annex Russische spion die zijn met liters drank overgoten relaas in één nacht afdraait aan een zootje nachtbrakers in een Ruso-Parijse bar. Een Roth (op instigatie van Zweig - eindelijk - afgewerkt in Amsterdam in 1936) die je meteen bij de lurven heeft en waar je met een groeiende verbazing in verder leest. Niet neer te leggen.

J R nos ofrece una de las más convincentes figuras del Demoio moderno, un ser melifluo que pasa de la policía zarista a la de lenin.